


Fire

by bookfairy_writes



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angel Castiel, Demon Dean Winchester, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-23
Updated: 2017-03-09
Packaged: 2018-03-25 08:18:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3803332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookfairy_writes/pseuds/bookfairy_writes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While Dean was a demon and Sam searched frantically for him, Castiel encountered him more than once.<br/>Explicit in later chapters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Smoke

He was there, just as Cas lit the match to summon a demon--a demon formerly his friend Dean Winchester. A demon as the result of Metatron's murder and the Mark's refusal to let go of its host. With the strike of the match, the smell of sulphur, there he was with black eyes and a wicked grin.

"An angel summoning a demon," the demon purred. "Well...sort of an angel...you're a bit of a wash-up, aren't you?"

Like a giant cat, deadly and dark, he prowled around the angel, looking him up and down as though he was something to be killed and eaten.

"Now what is it that you want, _Castiel_?" He said the name with relish, eyeing the angel in the trenchcoat."Would you like Dean Winchester back? Because here I am....and I have no desire to go back to that pitiful lot they call humanity."

 "Sam and I can make you well, Dean."

Dean leaned back, opening his arms to show his clearly intact body.

"Do I look unwell?"

The angel surveyed him, looking pained.

"Your soul...is in torment."

"And torment has never felt so good."

"Dean," Castiel began, but the demon cut him off.

"You can't kill me without killing your hopes of getting my human life back and you're not equipped to capture me. If you're just here to waste my time, I have a bar and some whores with my name on them."

Castiel's hand flew to the demon's wrist and there was a hiss and flare of pain where their skin touched. Both flinched, but didn't move.

"Dean," Cas said urgently. "If you remember caring for me at all, being my friend,"

"Then I might also remember some other particularly unpleasant human feelings. Which I think not. So if you'll excuse me," he yanked his wrist where Cas's fingers curled around it and instead of dislodging Castiel, the angel's grip held.

"Just try to remember, Dean."

"You can't hold on forever. Your grace will burn up in a week or two."

"I'll let you go, just...try and remember."

Rolling his eyes, Dean pulled on an expression of thought. His eyes snapped black and he grinned.

"I can remember a lot of things, Castiel. Betrayal, pain, fear...none of that now."

"Try remembering Sam. Remember Bobby. Remember me."

"This whole gay angel thing is getting old, Castiel. Let go or I will take my blade and carve you to pieces with it. I can mail you home to Sam feather by feather."

"Dean," the angel's eyes began to burn with a fierce blue light.

"You can't exorcise me, it is Dean Winchester's soul in his body...just a little model upgrade."

Dean's hand rested on the hilt of the first blade and Castiel's other hand dashed to grab his other wrist, succeeding in tugging it away from the blade.

"Just try and remember."

With an exasperated sigh that sounded so much like the old Dean that Cas almost let go, the demon closed his eyes.

"I remember something," he murmured. 

"Yes?" despite himself, the angel felt hope rise within him.

"Wanting to do this," the demon's upper body lunged forward and as Castiel leaned back, there were suddenly lips on his, hot and burning, pain searing through him where angel and demon met. Shocked, Castiel released the wrists of his friend, reaching to touch his face and...it was over. The demon Dean Winchester had vanished.

 

In a bar with a line of dancing girls and never ending shots, Crowley waited for the return of his partner, smiling when he heard the bar door slam into the wall as it opened.

"Dean," he raised a glass. "Enjoyable trip? The first summoning is rarely the weirdest but--"

"Shut up," Dean growled, tapping two fingers on the bar. 

Two shots of something dark and sharp slid to his hand and after downing them in quick succession, he looked at Crowley.

"I don't think summoning is my thing."

"Fine by me," Crowley shrugged. "Your sleeves are singed. Get into trouble?"

"Nothing I can't handle."


	2. Another Summons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After his first attempt to summon Dean Winchester the demon, Castiel tries again.

This time he had completed the summoning ritual when the demon Dean Winchester appeared before him.

"Castiel, why am I not surprised?"

The angel didn't reply, only frowned.

"What, the silent treatment? Come on man, the bait and switch is a classic. Surprise and vanish, just like a dream."

"That is not how I would describe it," Castiel replied.

"I hurt your feelings, huh? I wish I could say I was sorry...actually I don't wish that. Damn, being a demon has its perks."

"Dean,"

"Look angel. Your human plaything is gone. Stop with the jilted lover routine and get on with doing whatever it is that you harp-strummers do."  
"I do not play the harp."

Eyes snapping black, demon Dean shrugged in a lazy roll of his shoulders.

"Whatever. What do you want?"

"To ask for you to try again."

"At kissing you? No, I'm fine. I've got women for that. Between you and me, the human wouldn't have minded. He liked you, despite the ratty outfit and inability to manage life as angel, God, or human. Little bit of a crush, I think."

"Dean?"

"Past tense there, bird-boy. Human Dean might have had a thing for you....now me...I prefer them busty and by the dozen. And great thing about being a demon, that's how I get them. If you're going to just repeat a conversation we've already had, I'll pass."

Cas reached to grab his wrist and the demon pulled away.

"Ah ah ah, Castiel. This is how the whole mess got started."

"Being human, yes it is messy and painful but it was beautiful as well. Is there nothing you miss?"

Blinking, the demon's eyes returned to the human green of its host.

"Food's better, beer's free, and more women. No one to save, no one to chase, and no apologies. Nah, I think I'm good."

"I thought," Castiel began again.

"You thought that maybe that kiss I gave you meant there was some good in me after all? This ain't a Disney movie and if it was, I'm the villain. Go home."

With both hands, Castiel grabbed at the demon's waist and pulled.

"I can't give up on you."

"Fuck it," the demon muttered, and he grabbed the angel's face, pulling it to his so their lips met in a painful heat, angelic grace meeting hellfire. One hand moved from the demon's waist to his lower back and pulled him in closer. A tongue like a brand and tasting like fire forced its way into Castiel's mouth before withdrawing once more, flicking across his lips, over his teeth. Sharp, the demon's teeth seized his lower lip and bit down. It might have drawn blood had it not sealed itself, flesh preventing anything unholy from entering the body of his vessel--his body.

There was space between them once more and Cas gasped for breath he didn't need, his heart pounding.

"I guess I just enjoy the pain," the demon that was Dean Winchester said.

As the angel watched, the burns his lips had left on the demon began to fade.

"No more calls. Don't write, don't send Christmas cards. Basically just fuck off."

He vanished in a cloud of black smoke and Castiel traced his fingers along the burns on his own face as the grace began to heal them. He could taste fire and brimstone on his tongue.


	3. Bad Habits

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This time, Castiel doesn't summon a demon.

It was nostalgia that convinced him to get a hotel room for the night. Angels don't need sleep and though he was capable of lying in a bed with his eyes shut for hours, there would be no loss of consciousness, no quiet oblivion where he could stop thinking. Sam had called earlier, asking about Dean. Finding Dean, curing Dean, trying to make things right in the world. And he hadn't lied--no not really. He told the truth in its most basic form.

"I do not know where Dean is, Sam. But he is a demon now; even if we found him, he is not who you remember."

Sam had plenty to say to that, things about redemption and a cure and the world not being right without his brother in it. And while Castiel agreed, the world had been better with Dean Winchester in it, he was no longer human and no longer himself. There wasn't anything he knew of that could be done.

"Just...keep looking, Cas. I can't give up. I won't give up."

He'd hung up without saying goodbye.

 _Father_ , he'd wondered, _Is this what you planned? The best man I know condemned to hell once more for trying to save your creation?_

His Father did not answer. It had been a long time since answers had come from above.

The door to the motel room swung open.

"Speak of the devil and he shall appear," a low voice intoned and Castiel knew without looking, that it was the demon formerly his friend. Dean slouched against the doorframe, his jeans riding low on his hips, a tight black tshirt clinging to his chest. 

"What do you want?" the angel sighed.

"I had a thought. Thought you'd like to hear it."

"I doubt that there is anything you wish to say that I also will wish to hear, demon."

"Demon, huh? No more 'Dean'? No more 'you can be saved'?"

"What is it." Blue eyes met demon black ones across the room and Dean slid from the doorway and into the room.

"I don't have a job except to have fun...and getting in touch with my dark side, as it were. And I came to a bit of a realization," he paused for effect and Castiel blinked once, not saying a word.

After a moment, the demon frowned.

"You know, for a guy who summoned me twice, you don't look all that happy to see me, Castiel."

"Say what you have come to say."

"All right, angel boy. It occurred to me that it is a lot of fun to cause pain. And watching you get all torn up about my improved model was..." he shuddered dramatically, eyeing the angel as he did so. "...a _lot_ of fun. So I thought I might ask you...did you enjoy the pain?"

It wasn't what he was expecting and though it didn't show on his face, the demon's smile widened.

"You did enjoy it, didn't you? Daddy's little masochist angel, pining after a demon." He chuckled, low and almost a growl and the angel felt the sound move through him, a spark of unwanted arousal shooting up his spine.

"Dean, this isn't you," he began, and the demon crashed their mouths together. When he pulled back, he smiled, white teeth and black eyes.

"It is me...just not the me you want...and that just kills you, doesn't it?"

Demon and angel met again, mouths clashing, tongues and teeth moving in more of a battle than a kiss. Deep in his chest, Castiel could feel the guilt, the anger, the _wrongness_ of his friend, the man he had raised from perdition, but the kisses continued, intensified. Despite what he was now, Castiel craved Dean Winchester and like an addict, he would take any form he could get, even in touches that burned and smelled of brimstone. 

A rough hand tugged at his dress shirt, untucking it.

"Dean," he growled.

"Shut up, Castiel."

The shirt came untucked and the demon's hands smoothly unfastened his belt, undid the button of his slacks. It stung through the fabric, but something in him pushed forward instead of away. Maybe it was guilt, a wish for a punishing pain, something to make up for the wrongs he had done, the fall of the angels, his inability to save his best friend from Metatron. Maybe it was that the need for touch, the need for Dean that made him willing to accept the pain. He didn't know. 

Friction, rough and painful, rubbed him through his boxer shorts and even as it burned, the angel could feel his body responding. His groin warmed and he could feel blood rushing to where the demon touched him. 

"Does it burn, Castiel?"

His name flowed from the demon's mouth, smooth and _wrong_ but he nodded anyway, hated himself for nodding.

"Yes."

The pulls began abruptly and Castiel gasped at the sudden rush of...whether it was pleasure or pain he didn't know. All he knew was that whatever it was, it couldn't stop. 

"Do you know the best part about this whole thing, angel?" the demon whispered.

"Dean," Castiel muttered, shaking his head. 

"How much you're going to hate yourself afterwards." Dean Winchester purred the words at him and he couldn't help it, he let a little moan escape his lips. He could feel a pressure building in his groin as the demon jerked fiercely at his penis. However much he loathed that he accepted this despite who Dean was now, how far he had fallen, he couldn't stand the idea of it stopping.

Dean's lips tickled his ear when they whispered into it.

"He's not coming back, Castiel."

And then the demon was gone, and there Castiel stood in a motel room, his erection throbbing to the beat of his heart, the smell of hellfire in the air. Another little moan escaped his lips and looking from where the demon had been to his stiff member, Castiel dropped onto the matress and pulled away his boxers, taking himself into his own fist. The faint burns from the demon weren't healed yet and the pain blended with pleasure as he thrust and twisted in his own hand, the demon's face in his mind's eye.

When he came, it was Dean's name he moaned. And when he had finished and turned his head into the pillow to scream his pain, his anger, his loss into it, it was Dean's face still in his mind.

 

 


	4. Spark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Angels and demons are opposites, repelling each other. Why is it, then, that this particular demon and this particular angel seem to keep coming together?

How they'd gotten there didn't seem relevant to Cas as Dean dug a burning hand into his side, his mouth pressing deliciously painful burns against the angel's lips. He could feel his grace tingling, trying to keep up with the wounds that Dean's hands and mouth dealt but he forced it back. He deserved the burns for what he was doing. He deserved the searing pain in his neck as Dean's demon teeth drew blood from his skin, deserved each welt and blister wrought from the places where angel and demon met. In these moments, the pain intertwined with pleasure, he hated himself. He hated that not once had he tried to capture the demon and bring him back to the Men of Letters bunker. He hated that he hadn't mentioned these meetings to Sam, not once. And most of all he hated the desperation of these meetings, the fact that he wanted to see Dean, touch Dean, have him for just a moment more than he wanted to save him. If he truly loved his friend, what was left of his friend, he would have caught him by now, wouldn't he? He would have taken him back to the bunker he would have chained him and watched him suffer as he and Sam tried to bring back one of the best men he knew. 

 The demon Dean Winchester let out a little growl of pleasure and it wove its way through the angel's body.

"Self-loathing tastes delicious on you, Castiel."

A fresh wave of shame rushed over the angel and he tried to quell it by tilting his head back and letting Dean mark his throat with more burns, more bites. Between his legs, he was already hard, aching for the burning touch of what was left of his best friend, the man he had raised from perdition and grown to love. 

"I'm sorry, Dean." He barely moved his lips saying it, the whisper so low that had Dean not been a demon he wouldn't have heard it at all.

"Sorry enough for me to stop?" His lips caressed the angel's ear, leaving all flesh they touched red and painful.

Castiel groaned, digging his fingers into Dean's shoulders. No, not sorry enough for that. Not sorry enough to give this up.

"For all the preaching and prayer, you're no better than I am, angel."

"That's...not true."

Dean pressed a particularly searing kiss to his mouth, effectively silencing him.

"You've already given up on me, haven't you? You've accepted that this is the most you'll ever get of Dean Winchester and you don't even have the decency to tell my brother that you've seen me more than once and instead of trying to bring me back, you've turned belly up and offered me your vessel's cock."

"Shut up," Castiel growled, trying to mentally suppress his body's increasingly insistent urgings to rub himself against the demon, create enough friction for release from the slow build in his groin. 

Dean palmed the bulge in his pants, drawing a moan that the angel tried not to let escape his lips.

"If I offered to let you take me to Sam right now, what would you say?" He was unzipping his pants as he said it.

"I'd say you were lying," Castiel replied, slightly breathless. He was undoing his own pants, burning with self-loathing the entire time. _Weak_ , he thought to himself. _You are not worthy of your wings or your grace._

Dean met his eyes and they were not demon-black, no they looked as human as he had once been. Had he too been human he may have been fooled, but his angelic gaze could see inside Dean's body, see the twisted demon that was what remained of his soul. Seeing both at once hurt, like an old wound flaring up in pain. 

"And if I wasn't?" He hooked a finger in the waistband of Castiel's boxer shorts and tugged a few times, pulling the fabric over the hardness that sprang to attention the moment it was freed. Castiel gasped, momentarily wordless.

"Demons. Lie." He punctuated each word with a fierce tug at Dean's boxer shorts until he too sprung free.

"They don't have to. I could tell you all sorts of truths."

"Only because it suits you."

Shirts still on, pants and boxers around their ankles, angel and demon stood very close together, both undeniably aroused but for very different reasons.

The demon wrapped an arm around the angel's waist and tugged him closer so their skin pressed together from thigh to belly. Castiel hissed in pain and Dean echoed the hiss, following it with a low chuckle.

"No tolerance for pain?" He wrapped a burning hand around where their members stood pressed together between them. And he began to stroke, the two of them rubbing against each other and his hand as he stroked up and down. His fist curled around one side of the angel's cock and with his own cock pressing against the other side, Castiel could not deny that it was painful. The intensity of the burning brought tears to his eyes. But oh, the caress, however it burned, shot intense waves of warmth through his body--and not the burning warmth of hell and heaven's creatures meeting.

 "I've...had worse." The gasp interrupting the statement robbed it of some of its effect, but he wasn't thinking clearly enough to care. The only sensations were the burning and the pleasure wound and tied together so tightly that he could not imagine one without the other. His punishment and pleasure. An angel of the lord stooping low enough to be at the mercy of a demon.

"I'm sure you have."

The caresses grew rougher and Dean's fist tightened around them, drawing another gasp from the angel's lips. The only thing that made the yet another lapse in control tolerable was the knowledge that the demon was breathing hard now and his face showed not contempt or triumph but lust, hot and hungry. He was not the only one succuming to something he knew was wrong. Even if it was only for making an angel feel shame, the demon wanted this. The realization was punctuated by the first gasp to escape the demon, followed immediately by a low moan.

Castiel's palm was burning and when he was able to drag his eyes away from Dean's face, the demon's eyes having already snapped black, he saw that his hand had joined Dean's in wrapping around their cocks, rubbing and jerking as clear fluid began to seep from both heads. The liquid slid downwards, making their grips less rough as hands slid up and down, sped by their bodies' natural lubricant.

Dean's hand twisted viciously and the moan that escaped Castiel's mouth was an unholy sound, something that could not have been torn from the throat of an angel. It was too ragged and wanting, too filled with desperate need to have come from him. When Dean's hand repeated the motion, the angel could feel his knees weakening as his whole body shuddered, nerves overwhelmed by all the sensations coming in, pain and pleasure all tangled up in one.

It was Dean's voice in his ear, coming from Dean's lips but the demon Dean Winchester was not the man he knew. Still, in that voice the words struck him twice as hard.

"You could take hold of me right now if you wanted," he whispered. "You could put me in a devil's trap and bring Sam right here. But you won't."

Another jerk on the members encircled by Dean's fist and Castiel clutched at the demon to keep himself upright, no longer trusting his knees. In retaliation, he mirrored the jerk and twist of Dean's hand, causing a hitch in the demon's (unnecessary) breathing.

"Because you want this," another twist and tug, this one bringing him to the brink of orgasm, his mind and body so focused on the release that it barely registered the words.

"More than you want your friend back."

He finished the statement with a rapid set of wild jerks and Castiel's hips were bucking, thrusting spasmodically as he spilled his seed onto Dean's hand and their joined cocks. The jerks continued and once he had finished, he watched the demon's face clear in a moment of satisfying pleasure as he finished, semen spilling onto their joined hands and cocks.

With the satisfaction of release came the next wave of shame. He could have stopped to capture the demon but he hadn't. He had given up the chance to save Dean from himself and he had done it for no good or noble reason, only for the pleasure of being touched.

The demon used Castiel's shirt tails to wipe the semen from his hand and member before pulling his boxers and pants back up and vanishing.

Castiel could have vanished and reappeared, cleaned himself with a snap of his fingers. He did not, though. Instead he unbuttoned his shirt, pulled off his coat, shirt, undershirt, and stepped into a shower. With a washcloth and soap, he scrubbed the skin until it was nearly raw, the burns fast-healing but still painful. He scrubbed and scrubbed until there was no more of Dean Winchester on his skin.

What of the water on his face was from the shower head and what was from the tears brimming in his eyes, not even he knew.

 


	5. Fanned into Flame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This habit they have, angel and demon, of meeting and parting is beginning to fan the spark into a flame.

Castiel had a cell phone because it was how Sam and Dean....no...just Sam now...got into contact with him. It was for very little else and though he grasped the basic workings of it, it was still a shock when he got a text from an unknown number.

**_It's not as good without the self-loathing._ **

Tilting his head to one side in confusion, Cas clicked 'reply' and began the arduous process of typing back, pressing the number keys on his flip phone until the letters formed into a word. Punctuation was most difficult but he managed in the end.

**_What?_ **

It was, perhaps, a wrong number. He would prefer that it was an unknown number because the only person who would send him such a message was Dean and Dean was a demon. Dean seemed to draw his weakness to the surface before playing his vessel's form like an instrument, wringing pleasure and pain from it that he had not experienced before or since. His phone beeped.

**_Whores._ **

Again, the buttons, making numbers into words. 

**_I do not understand._ **

The reply was a set of coordinates. 

He was not going to go. He was not going to just appear because the demon wanted to degrade him. It was not Dean, not now. Dean, had he ever reciprocated Castiel's affections, would not be like this. Dean was a good man, kind-hearted under a rough exterior. The demon was none of those things.

**_Come on angel, don't you want to see the improvements I've made to this body?_ **

This was alarming. If Dean was to ever be restored, the damages done to his vessel would remain, at least the external ones. He hesitated a long moment, but with the sound of flapping wings and a rush of wind, he was there. And so was Dean...well. So was the demon that once was Dean.

He lay on a bed, an alarmingly large one, and naked women, seven of them, lounged around him performing various services. One fed him while another finger-combed his hair as a third performed a slow striptease. The fourth girl was rubbing his back while the fifth sat on his lap, slowly gyrating her hips against his groin. The sixth had a knife and was making shallow cuts along his leg, some kind of lettering. There was already blood on his chest, whatever words carved there too covered by red to be legible. The last woman had one of his feet propped on a stool and she was massaging it with some kind of lotion.

"Castiel," the demon said his name in that low purr that _did things_ to his vessel's body. "So glad you could join us."

"The cuts," the angel replied. "Are they the improvements you spoke of?"

"Mmm," he hummed noncommittally. "Ladies, we're done here."

The girls didn't bother dressing, and when Castiel glanced around the room he found that there were no clothes on the floor for them to collect. This lead to the question of where their clothing was but he didn't ask it aloud and the naked women were gone before he could ascertain whether they had been harmed.

"Those girls," he began, and the demon's hand flapped at him, dismissing the words.

"Are willing. I'm a demon, not some sort of monster."

"Technically," Castiel began, and the hand waved away his comment yet again. He bit his tongue and let his eyes run over Dean's body, the shirtless torso, the battered jeans with one leg rolled up, exposed leg and chest bloody, the bare feet.

"Why have you asked for me," Castiel sighed.

"I told you," Dean rolled his shoulders, sending the muscles of his chest rippling. "It's not as good without the self-loathing. I can have all the women I want but...y'know it's like hot wings. You don't want them all the time, but every once and a while," he paused to make a low growling sound deep in his throat. "Every once in a while you want everything to burn."

"And I am...hot wings?"

"You," he purred, "Are heavenly grace and self-loathing in  trenchcoat, stooping down to my level because you're so desperate for a taste of the old Dean, you'll do just about anything. It's a very unique flavor." 

"If you have only come to taunt me," Castiel began, but Dean shook his head, snapping his eyes black for just a moment before returning them to how they should have looked...how they would have been had Castiel not gotten him killed.

"Don't lie to a demon, angel. Whatever you're starting to say about leaving, we both know you won't do it. Why don't you come heal my wounds?"

"You are perfectly capable of repairing your own vessel," Castiel said, but he was walking towards Dean anyhow. A hand outstretched and traced a line over one of the cuts on his chest. 

Dean hissed, and the skin flared red at the contact. Castiel pulled his hand away rapidly, trying not to show the hurt on his face at the reminder that he could not touch his one-time friend without causing him pain. 

"There we are," Dean said, and with a blink, his skin was no longer bloody or cut. "Now are you going to strip, or will I have to do that for you?"

 "I am not a plaything," Castiel scowled. "I will not be summoned because you with to toy with me."

"But you will, won't you?"

"I will not."

And he was standing, his bare chest nearly brushing Castiel's trenchcoat, staring into the angel's blue eyes. 

"Oh no?"

"No." But his voice was less certain.

He was no longer staring into the angel's eyes. Instead, he had dropped onto his knees, was unzipping Castiel's dress slacks, pulling them down and palming his cock through the angel's boxers. Castiel inhaled sharply, surprised.

"Have you ever begged for anything, Castiel?"

It was a surprising question and he paused to think about it, casting his mind back over time.

"I'm not certain that I--oh." 

His boxers were around his ankles and Dean's--no not Dean's, he reminded himself fiercely, not _real_ Dean's--hot mouth was surrounding the tip of his penis. It hurt, but he was ready for the pain this time, ready for the meeting of angel and demon flesh and their nature's clashing. Something incredible was happening with little flicks of the demon's tongue against the underside of the head, right where it met the shaft. He could feel his knees weakening.

Brands on his bare hips--hands. Dean's-- the demon's-- hands gripping his hipbones, steering him until the backs of his knees hit the mattress and his body flopped down. 

His mouth his mouth, how could something hurt so much and feel so good? How did he know what to do to make his vessel shudder, pull moans from his throat? Lips sucked and if he looked over his pelvic bone he could see the brown of Dean's hair moving as his head bobbed up and down over the angel's groin. A particularly painful/pleasurable flicker of his tongue and Castiel's hips bucked, pushed back against the mattress before he could move too much by firebrand hands. If only it didn't burn. If only this was Dean, really Dean who wanted him for him and not for the pain and guilt he felt when he did this. There were so many ifs. 

"You're thinking about human me, aren't you?"

The sucking stopped when he spoke and did not continue. Castiel could have lied. He didn't.

"Yes."

A rumbly sound of pleasure came from between his legs where the demon's tongue began licking him from base to tip, each stroke both intensely painful and so pleasurable that he could feel the beginnings of an orgasm pooling low in his belly. 

"You just can't stop can you?"

Another lick. A pause.

"I want to save you, Dean."

Another slow lick.

"And if you can't?"

_And if I can't then I don't want to be anymore. I don't want to watch you destroy everything you ever stood for but I cannot bear to end your existence. I love you too much to do anything but come when you call and take what I can. This is not love as I have been taught. It is self-serving and it hurts and it is not patient, not kind. This is obsession, wearing love's trappings but I cannot bear to let you go._

He did not say any of it. Instead he sighed, deep and defeated. While his lips began to form an answer, the demon's mouth was on his cock again, this time sucking fiercely, taking the entirety of Castiel's length into the burning chasm of his mouth. The hands on his hips dug what little fingernails they had into his skin. His tongue, burning and almost too much to manage, danced up and down along the angel's length, circling the head and teasing the slit, tracing veins and rubbing back and forth before pulling, sucking-- _oh_.

He could feel heat flooding his body, his vessel, it didn't matter anymore. Nothing mattered but the exquisite pleasure-pain that was enough to bring tears to his eyes, enough that he may have wondered if he would have the grace to repair it between shuddering gasps. His hands were moving of their own volition now, running through Dean's brown hair and it wasn't Dean really, it wasn't Dean but oh did it matter did it really matter. Grabbing all the hair he could hold, he dug his fingers into Dean's head and his mouth was making words without his consent, moaning and gasping, panting Dean's name.

"Dean oh yes Dean. Dean don't stop, Dean don't don't--don't--" and the words dissolved into moans, gasps as his hips bucked against demon hands and he didn't care because even with the burns his whole body felt good good good, and the mouth on his penis didn't stop didn't stop until his body had ceased its bucking and he was gasping for breath that he didn't need, his hands still curled in Dean's hair, his muscles loose and limp. 

Forcing his fingers to let go, the angel let his head fall back on the mattress, eyes half-closed as he felt the demon remove his mouth from his skin, pausing to leave a vicious bite at his hipbone.

His grace tingled, danced across his vessel, healing, shrinking burns and making his skin new. How could it hurt so bad and bring so much pleasure?

The bed dipped beside him and Dean's face, even his eyes looked like Dean if only he couldn't see the demon underneath, hovered above him. A wave of self-loathing rushed over him, blotting out the pleasure. He'd done it again. He'd taken pleasure from Dean's tormented soul, the demon he had become. As it did, Dean's eyes flickered to demon black and he smiled.

"That's the best part...the realization that you've done it again...that guilt and self-loathing...ugh, it's nearly enough."

Castiel heard him unzip his pants.

"Now your job is to make it the rest of the way."

 The angel slid from the bed until he was standing on the floor once more and flushing red with shame, he pulled up his underwear, his trousers, zipping the fly back up and re-buttoning them at the waist. He heard the flop of fabric hitting the floor and raised his eyes to watch Dean kick his jeans onto the floor and slip out of his boxers, dropping them atop the crumpled jeans as he scooted to the edge of the bed, his arousal clear between his thighs.

A thousand words ran through Castiel's mind, the buzz of recent release still warming his bones, but none of them seemed sufficient. He deserved a punishment for what he had done, for his repeated weakness, his inability to control himself. If Sam knew that he had seen Dean so often and not once tried to capture and restore him, if he knew that Castiel was getting pleasure from this version of Dean and walking away over and over, he could only imagine the other man's fury, his hurt. When he dropped to his knees between Dean's legs, his kneecaps smacking the floor hard enough to bruise, he closed his eyes, kept his grace from healing them. The pain was a penance, a punishment for his weakness. As this would be.

Unlike Dean, he had no idea what to do with his mouth. He tried to replicate the slow licks and watch Dean shiver in pleasure. He tried sucking, one hand reaching to fondle Dean's testicles as he did. It burned everywhere their skin met, but he accepted that. He took the pain and let it fill him, a reminder of his failures. After a few minutes, he drew back, letting Dean's penis fall from his mouth.

"I don't know what to do," he said miserably, another welt raising on his lip where Dean's hardness had grazed it.

Leaning forward, Dean took Castiel's head and shoved it between his legs.

"Suck."

And he did.

When Dean said 'harder', he did as he was told, keeping his grace from soothing the burns in his mouth, on his face and hands. When Dean growled for more, he took more of the demon's erect member into his mouth, gagging a little as it hit the back of his throat. And when Dean was beginning to shake, when he held Castiel's head in place as he thrust into his mouth, his pelvic bone bruising the bridge of the angel's nose in a steadily increasing rhythm, he took it. He did not allow himself to close his eyes, to deny himself the pain of watching black eyes flutter shut as the demon reached climax, knowing that this was what he had done. He had killed Dean and would not try to make him well, only come back again and again to fail and be weak where he should have been strong.

When Dean had finished and was pushing the angel's head away, sliding his now-limp penis from between Castiel's lips, he chuckled lowly.

"Are you...oh my God are you _crying_ , angel?"

Castiel raised a hand to his face and felt the wetness there, the sting of salt as tears slid over the fresh burns on his face.

Dean laughed then, eyes black all the way through, and he shoved the angel's face away.

"You're pathetic."

Even when he had left, flown off away from the demon that was Dean, he could hear the laughter, hot and cruel. It burned in a way that even his grace could not heal.


	6. Alight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here's how it ends.

He was racing in a car to the bunker because Sam had called--Sam had Dean. With Hannah beside him, his grace fading rapidly, Castiel rushed towards his best friend. If Dean can be saved, perhaps he can be forgiven. He can make things right. He can pay for what he's done. Still, it doesn't seem fast enough, never fast enough. He had to hurry, to get to Sam and Dean. 

"I like the disease." 

The angel could hear Dean shouting at Sam between the smashes of a hammer on wood. The arguing, then a pause. A smash. Dean calling for his brother. He even sounded different, more sinister in a way that Castiel would have been unable to explain. He rushed through the halls of the bunker, freezing when he saw Dean swing the hammer at his brother's head, Sam turning around to press the knife's blade against his throat. He walked slowly then, meeting Sam's gaze and trying to move silently, not to alert the demon that was Dean Winchester. As Sam lowered the knife, Cas wrapped his arms around his best friend.

"It's over."

The captive demon struggled and Castiel allowed some of his grace to run through him, preventing Dean from escaping the cage of his arms.

"It's over," he repeated and Dean shouted, an angry bellow of protest. At some point between carrying him back and strapping him to the chair, Dean had fallen unconscious. As Sam injected another vial of blessed blood into his brother's arm, the angel was torn between soaking Dean up with his eyes and not allowing himself to look upon the man he had done nothing to save. 

"What the hell are we doing to him Cas?"

"I mean even after I gave him all that blood he still said he didn't want to be cured. He didn't want to be human."

The statement felt like a punch to the gut but he responded.

"I can see his point. You know only humans can feel real joy...but also such profound pain. This is easier."

Dean stirred and both Sam and Cas stiffened, weapons drawn. But his eyes cleared and then the holy water didn't burn his skin and Cas felt...satisfied. He was not worthy to speak to Dean ever again but Dean was right again, was whole. He could do his penance now.

Even still. He needed to make some amends. Knocking on Dean's door, reassuring him, updating him on...everything. And they didn't speak of it. Instead Castiel offered him solace, asked him to take a rest. And they parted.

xxxxxxxxxxxx

They did not speak of it, not ever. They fought monsters and defeat Metatron and brought about another apocalypse but Dean doesn't speak of it and so Cas left it alone. Until one evening in the bunker when Sam was out doing who knew what and it was just the two of them, Castiel and Dean Winchester, angel and human, friends and allies sitting on a sagging couch in front of a Lethal Weapon marathon. Then, Dean spoke, never looking away from the TV.

"I did some messed up shit when I was a demon, Cas."

"Dean, that wasn't you. You were...something else."

"I don't mean just the people I killed, Cas. I mean what I did to you."

Castiel looked at him, surprised. Dean had done nothing to him, it was he who had failed his friend. Dean swallowed hard and turned to look at him.

"I knew...I know Cas. How you feel about me. I've known for a while. And when I was...what I was...I took advantage of you."

"No," the angel replies sharply. "No, I had opportunity after opportunity to save you, to bring you to Sam and instead..." He looked at the floor, feeling the guilt he had pushed down rise up within him like nausea.

"I used you for what I wanted. I used your body."

"Cas, I was a consenting adult. I taunted you because I knew that you wanted me back and I used your--how you feel--as a weapon against you. I can't...I'm...it was wrong, Cas. It was wrong and I'm sorry I did that to you."

"I could have saved you," Castiel whispered, and he could feel tears in his eyes. Humans could feel pain more deeply than angels and still this felt like a knife twisting in his chest, like nausea and loss and guilt. 

Dean's hand rested on his knee.

"Cas...Cas look at me."

The angel looked up into blessedly human eyes, swallowed back the urge to sob.

"What we did was messed up. But it wasn't all you. It wasn't all me. And we're family. I forgive you. I just...I need you to forgive you too."

"I'm not..."

"Castiel,"

"Dean I hurt you."

"We hurt the people we care about, Cas. It's part of being human."

"I am not human."

"No...no you're not...but you're trying."

Castiel nodded and Dean gave an exasperated sort of sigh and used the hem of his flannel overshirt to dry the tears off Castiel's cheeks. 

"Come on Cas, take it like a man."

He nodded again and they stared at the TV again, Dean's hand on Castiel's knee. Even when Sam came back, it remained there. Even once Castiel's hand drifted over to cover it with his own hand, ever so gently. And when Lethal Weapon 3 was over and Dean stood up to go to bed, he turned his hand so it gripped Castiel's and lead him through the halls of the bunker and back towards his bedroom.

Dean kicked off his boots, walked over to the sink to brush his teeth while Cas stood in the middle of his room, perplexed.

"Dean."

The hunter spat toothpaste into the sink, rinsed out his mouth, spat again.

"It wasn't all demon, Cas."

"I don't understand."

Dean sat on the bed, patted the mattress next to him, looking at the floor instead of the angel.

"Me...you...it wasn't all because I was a demon. That one time on the couch with the Rosewater...it's been there, you know?"

The angel knew what he wanted Dean to be saying, knew what he hoped Dean would say but was unsure what he was hearing, what he was meant to take from the conversation. He looked helplessly at Dean.

"I don't--"

Giving a little growl of irritation, Dean cupped the back of Castiel's neck and pulled him into a kiss.

This wasn't like the burn of heavenly grace and hellfire. This wasn't pain and pleasure and guilt. This was just...Dean. Dean's mouth moving against his, Dean's fingers in his hair, Dean's hand on his knee again. It felt...right. And he kissed Dean back. He kissed him until Dean had to pull away, panting.

"Humans have to breathe, Cas."

"I apologize," the angel began, but Dean was kissing him again, soft and insistent. He let himself drop all the guilt, all the self-loathing, all the blame and just kiss Dean back. Kiss the man that he loved. When Dean paused for breath again, one hand was on the lapel of Castiel's trenchcoat and he had a question in his eyes. A question Castiel had been waiting for since he had first raised him from perdition.

"Yes, Dean," he breathed and this time it wasn't rushed. There was no frantic tugging of clothes, no tossing things aside in the rush to get to sex. Their mouths moved against one another as Dean gently helped Cas out of his coat, his tie, his shirt. Cas carefully pulled the flannel overshirt from Dean's shoulders, paused to let him breathe as Dean pulled off his ACDC shirt and Castiel pulled the white undershirt over his head. When their hands wandered, it was careful, exchanged looks to ensure they were okay, this was okay. When they were naked, full bodies pressed together, skin on skin just touching, drinking each other in, Dean met his eyes, again with a question.

"Yes Dean," he said again, then paused, looking back at his friend...his love. Waiting for a response to the same question, needing to hear it from Dean's lips.

"Yes Cas," the hunter said. 

If he thought it had been pleasurable before, this was something different entirely. Dean caressing him, Dean's mouth on his neck, his collarbone, his mouth. Castiel rested his hand on Dean's arm where his handprint once rested on the hunter's skin and Dean shuddered, a whole body momentary shiver.

"Dean?"

"I dream about it sometimes." Dean's voice was a hoarse, breathless whisper. "Your hands lifting me out. Making me whole."

"I cannot dream," Cas replied. "But I remember."

"Did you," Dean began and Cas didn't make him say it.

"I loved you even then."

Dean looked away, one hand tracing the curve of Castiel's jaw. He wasn't good with words. He showed how he felt, not said it.

"I love you Dean Winchester," Castiel said, lifting Dean's chin to look him in the eyes. "I, an angel of the Lord, fell in love with a human man who has been the best part of my millennia of existence."

"Cas," Dean muttered, embarrassed, and in lieu of responding, Cas kissed him. He let his hands wander down Dean's chest, across his abdomen, lower.

"Cas." Dean was gasping this time.

"I have long wanted to do this," the angel continued, letting his hand tangle in the curls of Dean's pubic hair. Dean inhaled sharply, one of his hands moving to cup the curve of Castiel's ass.

"Touch me," he whispered and Castiel did. He ran hands down Dean's stomach, up his chest, down across the lines of his back. Curling his arms around Dean, he thrust up against the other man's crotch and Dean let out another gasp.

"God, Cas."

"Don't blaspheme," the angel replied softly, pressing a kiss to Dean's lower lip.

"Just...keep doing that."

He could feel Dean's hardness pressing against his abdomen and he thrust again, rutting against Dean's skin. The hunter groaned and responded in kind, rubbing himself against Castiel's abs. The telltale warmth was beginning to spread through his limbs, arousal flushing his skin and dilating his eyes. There was no burning, no pain, no guilt. How could he have enjoyed the frantic escapist moments with demon Dean when there was this? How could he not have known about this, about Dean pressed against him from knee to chest, cocks rubbing between them, breath shortened and labored. How could he have not known about how soft Dean's mouth could be on his, the gentle nip of teeth on his neck? It was an epiphany that this was what he had been searching for, taking the scraps of what he thought was affection when all of this was yet to come. 

"Cas," Dean murmured and Castiel looked back at him, tightening his grip around Dean's waist as the other man's thrusts became less and less coordinated until he was shaking as orgasm washed over him, his seed spilling between their bellies.

"Cas," Dean murmured again, and then Castiel was coming as well, eyes locked onto Dean's as he finished. 

They lay there panting, eye contact unbroken until Dean yawned.

"We'd better clean this up."

Cas pressed a hand to Dean's arm, the same place the handprint used to be.

"I'll get it."

With a cloth he retrieved from the bathroom, he wiped off his own stomach, then Dean's. He rinsed it off and hung it to dry over the edge of the sink. In the mirror his skin was still flushed pink. He looked...relaxed. 

From the bed, Dean called him.

"You coming?"

The angel sat next to his hunter, now somewhat tangled in blankets.

"I don't sleep, Dean."

"I know." Dean rubbed the back of Cas's hand. "Just...stay with me tonight?"

"And as many nights as you'll have me after."

He never fell asleep--angels don't after all, but with Dean's arm around his waist, Dean's face tucked against the back of his neck, Dean's slow steady breathing in his ear...it was the closest thing to peace he had felt in a long time.


End file.
